New Sci Fi Setting Seeds

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by doctorevilbrain

Capitalism?

Both Capitalism and Socialism have been used as quasi-religious systems to support what is really an oligarchic cast system.

[PTTG]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

The Orville has the same communist utopia as TNG.

It's basically TNG season 8.

[Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

The Orville has the same communist utopia as TNG.

They have replicator technology and high-power power systems. A for-all-practical-purposes post-scarcity economy. Once you have a make-anything gadget and a practically-infinite power source for it, capitalism takes a body-blow and gets marginalized.

And getting this thread back on track ...

Remove acquisition of the Necessities of Life from social equations, you need something more cerebral than "where's my next meal coming from" to keep society purring. Some philosophy, some religion, something like that.

Maybe an Emperor with Godlike traits leading a Imperial crusade ... get some superhuman Space marines ... Nah. Been done.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2

They have replicator technology and high-power power systems. A for-all-practical-purposes post-scarcity economy. Once you have a make-anything gadget and a practically-infinite power source for it, capitalism takes a body-blow and gets marginalized.

All present-day economic systems are about managing scarcity. If you reduce scarcity beyond a certain degree, only tyranny could preserve them.

And getting this thread back on track ...

Remove acquisition of the Necessities of Life from social equations, you need something more cerebral than "where's my next meal coming from" to keep society purring. Some philosophy, some religion, something like that.

Maybe an Emperor with Godlike traits leading an Imperial crusade ... get some superhuman Space marines ... Nah. Been done.

At least these guys were upfront about that first. It was their only virtue. Military adventures are as good a way to generate poverty and keep people busy as any. If you read A for Anything trying for post-scarcity crashes society. So maybe you have conspiracies to prevent too much prosperity. The economic equivalent of the guys in this novel stagnating humanity for its vision of our good.

[Astromancer]

Try this one...

The 2020s and 2030s looked so good. Fusion power generation came online, quickly replacing fossil fuels by sheer cheapness. Quantum Computing, Material Science, Robotics, Genetic technologies and biotech, High-Temperature Superconductors, AI, and many other technologies shot from prototype to commercial production. The boom was vast, the 2040s were called "the Hungry Forties" for good reason. Mass automation has eliminated mass employment.

This is a relatively bright and shiny Cyberpunk world where the choice between Capitalism and Democracy is still undecided in the USA. This is a game of politics and dirty tricks. The PCs are political operatives trying to push for their idea of the good and the just.

[PTTG]

Imagine if the pro-democracy heroes lose. A world where a few powerful humans dominate the world thanks to their robotic minions is a shade of Reign of Steel.

The robotic masters will no doubt have weird egos and goals, even if they are political collectives; they could easily resemble the behavior of London or Berlin, or even Mexico City. The vast majority of the population will be simply at the mercy of these advanced machines, and may not even know that the robots are controlled, in some distant way, by human beings.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by PTTG

Imagine if the pro-democracy heroes lose. A world where a few powerful humans dominate the world thanks to their robotic minions is a shade of Reign of Steel.

The robotic masters will no doubt have weird egos and goals, even if they are political collectives; they could easily resemble the behaviour of London or Berlin, or even Mexico City. The vast majority of the population will be simply at the mercy of these advanced machines, and may not even know that the robots are controlled, in some distant way, by human beings.

A truly hellish scenario. The simple efficiency of their systems makes them far deadlier than A Vlad Tepes or a Louis Bourbon even if they are far more benign. And the total freedom from consequences they would have would quickly undermine their integrity and compassion.

Even as a vision of a possible future they could motivate furious resistance.

[Astromancer]

The planet Ynysblodau Was settled from a world called "soil" or "dirt." Some scholars say it's a mainly forgotten myth explaining that the natives were autochthons. Which makes little sense to some because the Mercans Myth cycle has them sailing to new lands by spells cast on the flowers of May.

Be that as it may, Ynysblodau was a garden world. Until someone or a group of people set up a screen that deflected one-tenth of the sunlight. That turned the Garden into a snowfield. Ten thousand years of winter reigned on Ynysblodau. Then, a group of esoteric scholars found how the screen worked and destroyed it. Now, slowly, summer is returning.

Ynysblodau, or originally "Ynys blodau" island of flowers, is a pastoral garden world that had been locked in an artificial ice age. Now it's going through a rapid climate change. Glaciers and snow fields are melting, slowly, the planet's albedo is still very high and slowing things down.

The human population of Ynysblodau had a cultural collapse (or most of them) although covens of scholars study the old technology (TL12^+) the general population of the planet lives at TL4/5 depending on the area. There are also tribes living at lower levels. Psionics are known, but psions tend to mask their skills as magic or miracles. Heck, some psions pass themselves off as stage magicians or technicians.

Although I said humans, the population is actually several different groups of parahumans. There are batlike flying folk, several types of sea folk, many types of homo superior parahumans, and stranger types as well. Some parahuman groups proudly announce themselves, others hide in plain sight.

The changing climate is a two-edged sword. The seas are rising drownding ancient cities, vast new areas of land are becoming fertile and warm. Both of these events bring vast migrations and wars.

This is a Baroque Sci-Fi setting like Viriconium, or The Book of the New Sun, or Dying Earth (yes the last one is fantasy, but it has the right mood/style). The distant planet allows the story to go where the PCs take it. There can be an interstellar civilization out there or not. (Maybe Kirk played logic games with the computer that maintained the screens and blew it up). The main thing is a no magic (but lots of biotech and Psi) low tech society with the feel and mood of fantasy settings which can evolve into many different types of sci fi settings.

[Astromancer]

The PCs are explorers, they were born either on Space Collonies, the cloud cities of Venus, the terraforming stations of Mars, the lunar cities, or the asteroid mines. Earth, long sealed off by the plague wars, awaits. Mankind's ancient home unknown and awaiting rediscovery.

Basically, this takes Star Trek/Orville type golden age explorers and puts them on an Andre Norton post-apocalyptic Earth. Since we've already invoked Roddenberry, Genisis II should be in the mix, more the Tyrannians than anyone else. Good villains that might be swayed to be allies with hard work. But the quest to find the mysterious Pax could be fun too.

Another twist might come from reading Lady Stanhope and other explorers in the 19th century Near East and India. The complex emotional reactions involved in exploring places from your ancient history and the exotic glamour of antique lands like California or Ohio could also be explored. Or simply take 18th and 19th century accounts of explorations in the Arab lands, India, or East Asia, and drop your Golden Age sci fi heroes into the midst of that.

[Astromancer]

Try this one...

At some time, presumably in the future, or what was the future once, someone or other rolled back time. How and why are clearly impossible to know at this time but there is proof that it happened. These proofs are called "Pragmaclasts" fragments of lost time. Only these fragments are worlds.

In that other history, Alexander the Great seems to have lived to a ripe old age and formed a very stable empire. The court of Alexander's empire seems to have gained the secret of Paper when Alexander the Great was in his seventies. The Printing Press was invented about two hundred years later. A scientific revolution followed by an industrial revolution occurred in the next two centuries.

The Alexandrian Imperidom terraformed many extra-solar planets. Many of these worlds were designed to be exotic and fantastic. Certainly, when the humans of our historical reality encounter these worlds they seem like a mixture of Planetary Romance and the Alexander Romance, with a sci fi take on the Arabian Nights blended in.

Basically, Star Trek meets Flash Gordon's Mongo. These worlds should be decadent imperial backwaters become fractured and dangerous. There should be problems for swashers, diplomats, con artists, military men, social engineers, and classical scholars.